


Nobody's Fool

by Viridian5



Series: The Same Old Refrain [3]
Category: Andromeda
Genre: Character of Color, Drama, Humor, M/M, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2001-09-04
Updated: 2001-09-04
Packaged: 2017-10-02 09:38:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Viridian5/pseuds/Viridian5
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dylan has to make some adjustments to his new situation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nobody's Fool

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for "Under the Night." _The Court Jester_ belongs to Dena Enterprises and Paramount Pictures.
> 
> Sequel to "Salvage" in The Same Old Refrain series, but it can stand on its own.
> 
> Part of this was inspired by "Under the Night" conversations with LaT and Kass.

"Thank you for returning my boys and their ships. You know how youth can be," General Njonjo said.

"They must be very smart, if they managed to steal two prototype fighters and elude detection from your fleet. Perhaps you should keep a closer eye on them in the future," Dylan answered, keeping his face carefully blank. "However, if they or any other pilots set themselves against my ship again, I'll be forced to do more than just disable them. You can understand that I don't want to set a precedent here. We have enough people attacking us without having to worry about high-spirited youth." Dylan wondered if his crew kept their expressions as carefully blank, then decided that it didn't matter much. Let Njonjo see a shark's smile or two on them and maybe learn from it.

Njonjo looked nervous. "Yes. I understand you. Thank you." He cut off the link.

"Joyriding youth," Dylan said.

"They'd be calling them heroes if they'd succeeded," Beka said.

Harper added, "Yeah, that and 'prelude to the invasion force.'"

"I think we're done here. Beka, take the bridge and take us out."

"Aye-aye, Dylan. I'll be sure to let you know if anyone else takes potshots at us."

Tyr followed Dylan out into the corridor. Dylan said, "I know, you would have blown them away."

"It was the little professor's idea to target the aft shield generators."

"Which his analysis showed would feed back into the engines and render the ships useless, a serious design flaw we could use against them. He had a good idea, and it let us stop them without killing them, which is my preference at this time."

"I worry about you, Dylan."

"Do you?"

"Harper, like the rest of the Maru crew, shows an admirable amount of self-interest. Are you so certain that he won't take advantage of your... receptivity?"

What the hell? "Tyr, perhaps you would care to explain that."

"You've both been professional in your public behavior and discreet, but he has your scent on him as you have his on you."

Great. "Are you making judgments?"

"Of course. Were you a different kind of man, I would have thought that you meant to bind a crewmember important to the operation of this ship closer to you through sex. But you're not calculating in that manner."

Whenever Dylan thought Tyr had reached the pinnacle of cynicism, Tyr managed to surpass it. "So you're thinking that Harper must be in it for some kind of benefit."

"Of course."

Dylan felt a headache coming on. "He's made no requests of me. I won't give him preferential treatment on duty, but by the same token I won't disregard his input in an effort to prove my objectivity. I'm sure that you would ask for concessions from me in his place, but he's not you."

Tyr just looked at him for a while, before asking, "Was that a proposition?"

It brought out the devil in Dylan. "No. But if it was...?"

"I see that you're not inclined to take my warning. I can only hope that you don't do us all damage by being compromised." Then he stalked off.

Dylan sighed. He'd hoped to avoid this kind of thing.

And couldn't he have been given at least one day of wallowing before dealing with the consequences or having it described back to him as something ugly?

"Hey, what's up with Tyr?" Harper asked. "He had the weirdest look on his face."

"It's just Tyr being Tyr." But Harper could use a warning. "And he figured us out."

"I doubt that'll ever happen, but I should have guessed he would have figured out what we were up to." Harper seemed surprisingly blase about it all.

Dylan needed to wipe the vile taste of his conversation with Tyr from his mouth. "Are you open to having dinner and a movie at my quarters?"

Harper beamed. "Sure. Movie first, though. Got something in mind?"

It made Dylan feel a bit better. "I need a comedy. A comedy that isn't my life."

"That would rule out slapstick, then." When Dylan affectionately smacked his arm, Harper answered, "See?"

  


* * *

Dylan decided that he enjoyed watching ancient comedies much more when he was wrapped around Harper, sitting fitted together like spoons, with that spiky blond head leaning against his shoulder and Harper's bare feet resting against his. It also did wonders for purging some of the ugliness Tyr's line of reasoning had rubbed his nose in.

"So, what did you think?" Dylan asked.

Harper leaned back. "Funny movie, and it's great that he got Jean and all, but putting that baby on the throne... that's what they risked their lives for?"

"He's the rightful heir."

"He's in diapers!"

"It was the right thing to do."

"I don't care if he's 'the real king,' he's too young to rule. Which means that someone will rule for him, and with how corrupt that court is, I don't see that someone being much better than the usurper was. Besides, if they'd stayed out of it, Ravenshurst would have killed Roderick for them, not that Ravenshurst was a prize either."

"They couldn't have known that."

"C'mon, the people who'd support a guy who'd murder a whole royal family don't exactly have any loyalty you can rely on. So even after all the trouble the freedom fighters went to, the kingdom will still have a bunch of people brawling over who gets to rule it, only now they'll do it by trying to be the one who holds the kid's leash. Do you really think that baby's going to survive very long? He would have been better off as a farmer. At least that way he had a chance of living to see adulthood."

"He's the heir to the throne." But it was hard to keep a straight face when he had Harper's feathery hair brushing his chin.

"Speaking in a stick-up-your-ass way, it may have been the right thing to do, putting Roderick down and putting the kid up. From a real life standpoint, it's dumb. It just is."

"Harper, it's a comedy."

"Doesn't mean I have to turn my brain off." Harper smiled darkly. "I'm amusing you."

"Is that a bad thing?"

"It depends on _how_ I'm amusing you."

"You're so sensitive."

"Hey, I'm still trying to decide if you were trying to make some kind of crack by showing me a movie featuring singing, dancing, and fighting midgets."

"They were highly skilled midgets." At Harper's playfully lethal look, Dylan said, "I didn't think of it. Almost everybody's shorter than I am."

"And you're fortunate we don't hold that against you. Often." Harper leaned back more, closer, against Dylan, then stiffened and leaned forward again. "Sorry. I'm a bit of a contact fiend. If it gets to be too much, just let me know and I'll back off, okay? I'm just taking advantage after the long famine."

Dylan pulled him back in close. "Long famine?"

"I don't want to think of how Beka would have reacted if I just came out one day with 'Hey, Beka, snuggle me?' Rev was right out of the question. Trance rubs my back a bit now and then as a comforting thing, but she would have figured I was putting the moves on her if I asked for more, and then she would have backed off totally. You know, I was used to sleeping with people while I was on Earth." Harper smacked his arm. "_Sleeping_ sleeping with them, not as in 'Seamus Zelazny Harper, Slut Boy of Earth.'"

"I never thought that for an instant."

"Right."

"I'm comfortable like this." Dylan nuzzled spiky blond hair and let his hands slide over Harper's stomach.

Harper wiggled, but they felt like happy wiggles. He smelled like metal and electricity, charged particles, reminiscent of the Andromeda Ascendant's engine room, as if he were literally a part of the ship. Under that Dylan could detect a faint hint of citrus-scented hair gel, which Harper used less of than people realized, since his hair seemed to stand up almost as much from static as styling.

"Very comfortable, feels like," Harper said.

"If you want to stay, I'd love to have you. Not that I'd have to have you to allow you to stay...."

"It wouldn't be an all the time thing anyway. I like my space and privacy sometimes too."

Dylan had trouble getting the words out, and Harper wasn't helping. "What I meant is that I like it when you're around. Whenever, however."

"_However_? Oooooh, Dylan."

"Brat. You don't have to do anything to stay. Or let me do anything to you."

"Maybe I'd like you to do things to me. Maybe I'd like you to fuck me," Harper purred.

Dylan's heart raced. "Would you?"

"Maybe."

"You're not helping."

"Is that what I'm supposed to be doing?" Harper turned to face Dylan, draping himself against his chest, and nibbled his ear. "Helping?"

"Yes."

"Define this 'helping' for me." One of his hands slid down Dylan's ass, and he pressed closer.

Dylan ran his fingers over the closely shorn hair at the nape of Harper's neck and smiled at the way it made Harper shiver. The peach fuzz seemed to stroke his fingers back. "Do you really want me to lay down rules and structure for you? I'd be more than happy to, but I'm not sure that's what you want."

"Depends on how you do it, I guess. And you think you know what I want?"

"I'm willing to make some educated guesses."

"And act on them?"

Dylan couldn't resist answering, "Maybe."

"Want you. Want you so bad," Harper said hotly into his ear. "Even if you really are evil after all."

Silly to get such a warm feeling over something that was only banter. "Maybe that's what I really wanted."

"For a guy trying to single-handedly restore the Commonwealth, you don't aim very high."

"Not single-handed."

Harper actually smiled at that. "Yeah, true. Septuple-handed? Though that'd actually be 14 hands and a tail. What? You're distracted again."

"I'm thinking about Tyr. Not like that!" As Dylan grabbed Harper's arm, he reflected that Harper was about as easy to hold onto as a cat when _it_ didn't want to be held. "Not like that."

Harper settled down. "Better not. It's rude when I'm right here and all."

"He might be trouble."

"You're remembering times when he wasn't?"

"True."

Harper sighed. "I know the captain's a part of you and all, but is there any chance of you putting a muzzle on him for a while? Because, otherwise, I can go get dinner."

"You're dinner," Dylan said as he pinned Harper to the bed and nibbled on his neck.

"This is much more like it." Harper's hands came up under Dylan's shirt and stroked along his back. "I like this turtleneck, but right now I'd like it better off."

Dylan obliged. "Better?" He had similar designs on the soft, worn-out undershirt that Harper had on. It was so thin that Dylan could see the rosy shadow of one of Harper's nipples through it.

"Much," Harper murmured into his chest. The warm breath distracted Dylan from his plans. "I've been developing a fetish for uniforms because of you, you bastard. At least I still hate the white. But, you know, if you'd been wearing the one with the khaki pants when we first met, you would have been questioning me and I would've been like 'Uhm, what?'"

"You like them that much."

Harper tongued Dylan's left nipple. "Dylan, the khakis show off your package."

"No, they don't," he answered as he shivered.

"Uh-huh, they do. Actually, the whole meeting was like something out of a porn vid, though in a porn vid when I was lying on the floor on my back with your force lance in my face, you would have said something like 'Suck on it, boy, suck on it.' You can tell a lot about a society by its weapons, and the Commonwealth's force lances look like dildos. _Really_ makes me think I was born in the wrong time."

"You're trying to jolly me."

"Is it working?"

"Not really, because now I'm remembering that you would have died of Triangulum Measles if the Maru crew hadn't found the Andromeda." Dylan was frustrating the hell out of himself. He couldn't stop depressing himself no matter how hard he was or much he wanted to lose himself in Harper.

He was frustrating Harper too, who growled with frustration. "Except that I am alive. C'mon! When you said you had something planned for me that would take hours, this is not what I thought you meant. This is verging on sadomasochistic."

Dylan sighed. "I'm a sadist and masochist all in one here."

"I'm not either. I'll go somewhere to jerk off and be back when you're ready or whatever."

"Harper, I'm sorry."

But instead of getting up off the bed, Harper remained pressed against Dylan and propelled them backward until Dylan's back was against the wall, pinning him a bit, torturing him with the feel of Harper's body hard against his. Then Harper sighed, closed his eyes, and rested his head on Dylan's shoulder.

Dylan looked at the bare expanse of his neck, properly Harper-pale instead of red and scratched raw as it had been when they'd first met. Harper might have felt some lust at first sight, but it hadn't gone both ways, not when Dylan had been so intent on getting this grungy, ship-stealing invader and his cohorts off the Andromeda. Yet Dylan had been surprised that this invader had been cautious but not afraid of him and that a person he had at the end of a force lance would try to break the news of the Commonwealth's destruction gently, even looking sympathetic as he did it.

Attraction had come later, after he'd gained a respect for Harper's abilities, loyalty, and quick wits.

The skin felt warm and smooth against his lips, with not even a scar left from an affliction that would have slowly eaten the flesh off of Harper's bones if Andromeda hadn't healed it. Harper made a contented sound and curled in closer, bucking a little as Dylan nipped at his ear. "You are such a tease," he said in low, dark voice, sounding pleased.

"I'm not the one wearing the threadbare undershirt."

Harper pulled away from Dylan long enough to yank it off over his head, ruffling his hair. "Any other problems?"

"The pants too."

Harper started to unfasten them, saying, "That's good, because if you're set on kissing all the places I had that rash to make sure it's better--"

Dylan had to laugh. "I'm not going to believe you had it _there_."

"You think I would scratch that in public? I have some sense of class. Now kiss it."

"Convince me."

Harper stripped down quickly, then laughed as Dylan pounced. Helpless giggles and abuse of Dylan's name interrupted some of Harper's gasps as Dylan's lips and tongue found ticklish spots on his stomach. Cursing followed as Dylan's downward path bypassed a rather important area in favor of kissing the soft skin of his inner thighs, though he spread his legs to make access easier. Or out of some hope that he might prompt more direct action.

When Dylan failed to take a hint, drawing things out and enjoying Harper's sensitivity, Harper moaned, "Fuck me, Dylan. I mean it. C'mon."

Dylan didn't think he could get any harder, but he played it cool. "So impatient."

"Instantaneous gratification is too slow, and you're a hell of a lot slower than that. C'mon. I'm dying to try your force lance."

"That's... the worst line I've ever heard. Not very original either."

Harper grabbed Dylan's hand and set it atop his hard, slick cock. "I'm going to get some satisfaction out of you if I have to make you jerk me off yourself."

Dylan couldn't help stroking a little while he had his hand there and breathed deeper as Harper writhed at his touch. "It won't come to that. Let me get some slick first. You can wait that long?"

"Yeah, but much longer, and--"

"And?"

Harper looked utterly feral, teeth gritted in a fierce grin, eyes gleaming, as he said, "I'm getting a piece of you one way or another, Hunt."

Amazing how much more speed Dylan could find in himself during emergency situations. He knew that if he didn't move quickly, he wouldn't be able to retain control of himself long enough. Harper rode his fingers with utter abandon, intent and shameless and the hottest thing Dylan had seen since yesterday. To keep from coming, Dylan distracted himself by wondering if the surgery that had connected Harper's cranial database into his brain and nervous system might have contributed to his sensitivity. Every touch and thrust of Dylan's fingers seemed to have a greater effect than he expected.

Or it could just have been Harper.

Watching all of that writhing and moaning had brought Dylan to a state where he could feel his own lust pounding through his whole body along with his heartbeat. He needed in. Now. Harper's whimper as he withdrew his fingers only amped him up further. But as he positioned himself, Harper suddenly cried, "Wait! We need... you need--"

It took a moment for understanding to penetrate the fog. "No, we don't. Really. We're safe."

"Oh. Wow. Why don't you ever mention that as a benefit of joining the Commonwealth?"

Dylan kissed the head of Harper's cock, as he'd been asked to earlier. "I'll keep that in mind. Ready?"

Harper shivered. "Hell yes."

Dylan pushed in as slowly and as smoothly as possible and felt Harper pushing down to meet him. He couldn't think, only feel, and it was an incredible relief and pleasure. They rested for a moment, slick skin to slick skin, breathing hard. Eyes closed, Harper bit his lip and wrapped himself around Dylan, every bit as flexible as all of that sliding under railings he did suggested he'd be.

"Am I hurting you?" Dylan gasped, happy that he'd strung a sentence together through the distraction of the hot, welcoming clasp of Harper's body. His hips did a few micro-thrusts independent of what brain he had left.

"S'good. Really good. Been awhile. Forgot. More?"

Dylan would have found it hard to say no even if he'd wanted to. As he moved, he knew he was doing it the best way because Harper _rippled_ every time he hit the right spot. After all the deferment, he didn't last as long as he wanted to, coming hard with a few powerful thrusts that made Harper shout. Wanting to give a better account of himself, he stroked Harper's cock until Harper climaxed as well.

As the high faded, Dylan finally realized that he had his full weight draped on Harper, so he raised up a bit, separating them. "Sorry."

Looking utterly blissed out, Harper simply made one of his eloquent sounds that meant "no problem, whatever." His smile deepened when Dylan kissed him. "More than worth it. I have me my own High Guard captain, and I think I'm keeping him. Done with brooding for a bit?"

Dylan felt too good to think. He had to keep this in mind. Or not in mind. Whatever. "Yeah."

"Somehow I don't feel like I have the strength for dinner. You keep promising me dinner, but we never get to it. You have some evil plan to starve me?"

"You're the one who always wants to do something else first."

"Sure, make it all my fault."

Dylan teased Harper's hair with his fingers then stilled as something occurred to him. "That undershirt wasn't in the pile of things Rommie brought you this morning. Hell, none of the things you threw on the floor just now was in that pile."

"You are one observant guy."

"I am about the important things."

"Don't you dare try to tickle me again. Okay, I got in a little mess on the Maru. Nothing to worry about. You know how it is; you add new parts to an old system, it makes the rest of the components work closer to the way they should and thus _harder_, so some of the other old stuff wears out faster. I got myself filthy, so I changed into something more expendable in case I had to go slogging through anything else. Old shirt, old pants, etc." Harper smirked. "You seemed to like the undershirt, though."

"It was translucent in places."

"And from that dreamy smile on your face, I seem to have a winner. I'll just have to parade past you in my rattiest clothes from now on."

"Only in private."

"Are you telling me what to wear now? Am I going to have to--"

Dylan kissed him again. "No, you don't have to go onto the bridge wearing something so threadbare it's see-through just to show me who's boss."

"Well, good, because I might get jumped if I had all my goodies on display in public, and it would be all your fault."

"Jumped?"

"It could happen. Trance loves her strays. Rommie maybe just needed to see me looking _completely_ disreputable. Or Beka did. Or, gah, Rev might be into that. I dunno."

"Then I suppose that it's a good thing we won't have to find out."

"That's for sure." Harper burrowed in close. "I like watching movies with you."

"I could get used to your commentary."

"I stayed quiet through the vid," Harper said, his tone making it clear that he felt he'd made a great sacrifice.

"True."

"There's some stuff Beka won't watch with me 'cause she says I annoy her too much, but there are some vids we watch where we annoy the hell out of everybody else. Slasher stuff. Like where there's a killer on the loose, but the bimbette has to check out the noise in the cargo hold all by herself with no weapon and in her underwear."

"And she just made out with her boyfriend recently."

"Wow. There really is nothing new out there. Anyway, if Bimbette or Himbo are _really_ stupid, the two of us start rooting for the killer. Out loud. Rev generally fled to the other end of the Maru when he started hearing us shout things like, 'Behind the crates to your left! No, your other left!' or 'She's over there. Can't you hear her jiggling?' The jiggling comment would be from Beka. I tell her she should be less catty, but she just smacks me."

"What if you decide the killer is too stupid too?"

Harper shrugged. "We both die a little inside at the betrayal, then turn the thing off. We did that a lot. At least we rent or barter for most of the entertainment stuff instead of buy, so it's not a total waste of money. And why do you let me blather on about this stuff for?"

"I like your blather."

"I'm really not sure if that's a compliment or not."

"You're all my crew. Of course I'd like to know how you lived before you met me."

"And here I was thinking I was special."

"Do you see anyone else here?"

Harper made a show of looking around. "Not at the moment."

"I assure you that I'm not making the rounds of the crew."

"That's good, because I can get jealous."

Dylan smiled. "You're going to be a handful, aren't you?"

"Wasn't I already? Besides, that's a good thing. Hey, I like it when _you're_ a handful."

"That's why you have your hand on my ass?"

"It's one of the reasons. You're a big boy, a very big boy--"

"Thank you."

"--so you can figure out the rest. See, I don't have to ask why you have your hand on mine. Are you going to do anything with it?"

"My hand or your ass?"

"Either. Both."

"You want more?"

Harper slid down his body, smiling as Dylan's hand trailed up his back. "Always. Famine, remember? Besides, we've been talking long enough for me to recover, and you're right here... and you taste good...."

"You're going to make me pay for not feeding you." If you could call having a very talented tongue teasing you "paying." The gentle rub of teeth against his cock made him shiver.

"You could have brought me something, but no. So I'll have to snack on you instead."

  


* * *

Dylan woke with Harper wrapped around him in what looked like an excruciatingly uncomfortable position. It made him hurt just watching it. Besides, they had to get up anyway. "Harper."

"Mrrf."

"Harper."

And then Harper was awake, as if someone had turned the power on. "Hi."

"Hi yourself."

"My arm's asleep."

"I'm not surprised."

"So could you...?"

"Oh. Sure." Dylan sat up. "How did you get it under me to begin with?"

"Talent." Harper grabbed him and pulled him back down. "Did I say that I was done with you? No, I did not."

"My being captain means nothing to you whatsoever."

"Of course not."

Dylan sighed. "Duty."

Harper set his hand on Dylan's half-hard cock and idly stroked. "You seemed to be enjoying yourself last night."

Immediately aroused again, Dylan considered a life spent in bed. It wouldn't be a bad life, not at all, but, short of a fundamental change in the way existence worked, he didn't see how it would help reestablish the Commonwealth. "You know what I'm talking about. My duty. Ship duty. Captain stuff."

"I couldn't interest you in a quickie?"

Caught between the urges to be appreciative and appalled, Dylan asked, "What did you do with all of this sexual energy before you became involved with me?"

Harper grinned, then looked down and traced light, maddening circles on Dylan's chest. "How much detail do you want me to go into?"

Dylan groaned. "None. Not right now." He sighed. "Quick?"

"It's not something I boast about often in this situation, but I can be quick."

"Then bring it."

"Yes, sir, Mr. Martyr, sir. But you have to help a bit." Harper handed him the slick.

His mind sleep- and lust-fogged, Dylan needed a minute to figure out exactly what Harper wanted. His pulse jumped once he got it. But.... "Don't you still ache from last night?"

"A little, so a little more won't bother me." Harper kissed him. "Want you."

Dylan really didn't see how he could argue with that, especially not with Harper nuzzling him and stroking the slick onto his cock, especially when he could barely think. "You're going to kill me."

"Most people wouldn't have any problem going out like this."

"I don't either." Dylan's fingers met with less resistance this time, and Harper was still a bit slick inside from last night.

"I'm ready," Harper finally gasped, then climbed atop Dylan and impaled himself.

Dylan fought to hold himself back from exploding right there, because he didn't want it _that_ quick, but the feel of Harper around him and the sight of him looking down, affectionate and dazed with pleasure, riding his cock, made it so hard. But then Harper started to slide himself up and down, taking the decision out of Dylan's hands. Thrusting, lost in Harper, drowning in the feel of Harper's hands and kisses and the warm, slick skin against his own fingers, Dylan came hard, feeling it whip through his whole body.

As sense gradually returned through the afterglow, Dylan licked his lips and asked, "Harper, did--"

Harper, draped atop him, looked up and said, "I was right there with you. Hard not to be while riding the thunderbolt. Breakfast?"

"Are you offering or asking?"

"Your quarters, Dylan."

"I think you crippled me."

"I thought the High Guard was made of sterner stuff than this."

"Fine. But don't get used to me making breakfast for you every morning."

Harper's grin nearly blinded him. "Yeah, yeah. We'll see."

Every morning. The thought of "every morning" made Dylan very happy, no matter what Tyr--who, as Harper had pointed out, was usually trouble anyway--had to say about it.

He was no fool.

 

### End


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